Chaos;Child is the fourth game in the Science Adventure Series, and the sequel to Chaos;Head. It was initially released in 2014 for Japanese audiences, and in 2017 on the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita for Western audiences. Now, the game’s translation is receiving a brand new Steam port.
The folks at Spike Chunsoft were kind enough to let us check out Chaos;Child before its release on January 22nd/23rd (The game’s release date depends on the user’s region.)
The game’s Steam page can be found here. It is priced at $35 USD, and will be sold at a 10% discount for the first week with 10 digital OST tracks included as a bonus.
The game follows Takuru Miyashiro and the rest of his friends in the Newspaper Club, as they investigate a series of murders that are occuring in Shibuya and bear a striking resemblance to a another serial murder case from six years ago. However, Takuru soon realizes that he may be in too deep—the murder mystery that he was chasing is now beginning to chase him.
Despite its status as a sequel to Chaos;Head, one does not need to read Chaos;Head prior to reading Chaos;Child. Checking out Chaos;Head beforehand is highly recommended, but Chaos;Child is a self-contained story for the most part, with very few returning characters from Chaos;Head. The game does a good job of recapping essential elements of the previous game’s story through flashbacks and the in-game tips list.
Chaos;Child has multiple endings that can be reached by means of the “Delusional Trigger” system. The player can decide if the protagonist will experience a positive delusion, a negative delusion, or no delusion at all. While this won’t affect the story in the player’s first playthrough, the route which the story takes in subsequent playthroughs can and will be influenced by the choice of certain delusions. In order to reach the true ending, players must first complete each heroine route.
To anyone that typically plays with a guide, we highly recommend using this one.
Chaos;Child’s story is a thrilling adventure, full of unexpected plot twists and an unsettling atmosphere that fans of horror and mystery visual novels alike will appreciate. The story starts out slow to introduce the characters, their motivations, and the plot. This is the the standard for most games in the SciADV Series, but the build-up is worth experiencing for the wild ride that it evolves into as the story progresses.
The translation for this release is largely the same as the console release, which is not necessarily a negative quality. The translator did a great job of conveying the story in the target language, which is an important factor considering the intricacy of the game’s plot.
We did notice that the game’s script, which contained many typos in the original console release, was scarcely updated for the new Steam release. While these typos ultimately will not affect your understanding of the translation, it would be great the game received a new editing pass through an update in the future.
The game’s art is also one of the highest points of the game. Chaos;Child has some of the most detailed backgrounds, CGs and character sprites in the entire Science Adventure Series, if not the visual novel genre in general. For example, the game utilizes a wide variety of shaders to allow character sprites to blend in with their surrounding backgrounds. This aspect of the game allows for some awesome looking scenes, and is great for player immersion.
The Steam port does unfortunately have a fair share of issues which we hope will be patched soon. We’ve noticed that these bugs are similar in nature to bugs present in Western SciADV releases prior to Spike Chunsoft’s acquisition of the rights to publish MAGES. games in the West in 2017. In bringing attention to these issues, we hope that the Japanese side of the business will be further motivated to iron them out, seeing that they are likely in charge of doing so.
These issues, while somewhat troublesome, can be ignored for the most part—in fact, we urge you to not let these issues stop you from trying out Chaos;Child, as it is worth experiencing regardless of these minor setbacks.
Players of the original console release will be happy to know that the post-route voice lines, previously untranslated, are now translated for the Steam release. This also applies to an untranslated voice line that appears a few times mid-game.
The biggest problem with the release right now is the untranslated in-game map. While the street names on the map are largely irrelevant for most of the game, a segment in one of the heroine’s routes requires the player to mark specific locations on the map to proceed without getting a bad end. Until this issue is fixed, here is a link to an image showing which areas to mark.
Playing in the lowest supported resolution (1024×576) will cause sprites to appear to be more pixelated than they actually are. We recommend playing in either 1280×720 or 1920×1080.
Overall, Chaos;Child is an amazing game, and it’s the one of the best stories in the SciADV Series. If you’re a fan of Science Adventure, or a fan of visual novels in general, you’ll definitely want to give this visual novel a shot.
On a final note, if you haven’t already, be sure to check out Operation HiddenHand, a fan initiative to help bring more Science Adventure titles to the west officially. You can find their Twitter profile here.
Score:
8/10
Spike Chunsoft delivered a solid English port of one of the best games in the Science Adventure Series. Though it does contain some strange bugs, they do not interfere with the player’s enjoyment for the most part. Hopefully, these issues will be patched out in the near future.
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